Date
10-16-2025
Department
College of Arts and Sciences
Degree
Doctor of Philosophy in History (PhD)
Chair
Aaron J. Palmer
Keywords
2A, RKBA, Second Amendment, right to keep and bear arms, Constitution, Bill of Rights, American founding, Founding Fathers, intellectual history
Disciplines
History
Recommended Citation
Davis, John Charles, "An Intellectual History of the American Right to Keep and Bear Arms" (2025). Doctoral Dissertations and Projects. 7551.
https://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/doctoral/7551
Abstract
This dissertation presents an examination of the intellectual history of the American right to keep and bear arms, as well as its embodiment in the Second Amendment of the United States Constitution. The document presents the history of ideas surrounding the concept of the right to keep and bear arms, from early Western Civilization through various channels, including English traditions, and how they contributed to the unique perspective on the right to keep and bear arms that emerged in America. Explores not only English contributions, but those of the Scots, and philosophers throughout Europe and Western Civilization, as well as the modifying factors in the Americas that acted upon these precursors. Examines how and why the founding generation developed the particularly American expression of the concept of a right to keep and bear arms, contributing to a greater understanding of the involved concepts as well as their founders’ intent in including the Second Amendment in the Bill of Rights.
